


Internet Safety

by orphan_account



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Humor, Gen, Humor, tumblr!, uncertain relationship status
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-25
Updated: 2013-01-25
Packaged: 2017-11-26 20:27:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/654100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's certain things that even best friends shouldn't know about each other...<br/></p><p>Or, the one where Louis is closeted and Harry loves fanfiction</p>
            </blockquote>





	Internet Safety

**Author's Note:**

> Based off a prompt on Tumblr:
> 
> "Louis is gay, but he's not ready or comfortable with coming out yet. He comes across some slash fiction about him on tumblr and is incredibly upset. Like, sobbing convulsing mental breakdown. Harry comforts him to no avail and gets super pissed off."

It wasn’t often that Louis had spare time on his hands what with the hectic work schedule that being in the band entailed, but that Sunday afternoon he’d finally been granted enough free time that he was actually bored. So for the past few hours he’d simply been web-surfing: watching a couple of funny YouTube clips; checking Facebook and Twitter every five minutes; even looking up a cake recipe in the hope of making one for Harry’s birthday before giving up after the words: ‘Cream together the butter and the sugar’.

As he was tweeting his fans for about the 100th time that day he saw a message that piqued his interest. One girl, he forgot her username instantly, had asked him jokingly whether he’d ever checked Harry’s internet history.

He hadn’t (after all it was none of his business) but what with his lack of any way other to fill his time he decided it could be something to do. It would be a laugh at any rate if he revealed how Mr Styles spent his browsing time to the virtual world, although he would edit it if needs must for the sake of his friend’s privacy. And there was absolutely no way he was going to end up regretting it.

As he made his way into the younger boy’s bedroom his nose was assaulted with the smell of Lynx, sweat and something unidentifiable that all teenage males seem to exude. Sighing, he knew he would have to be particularly extensive with his cleaning duties that weekend in order to clear up the tip. The laptop he was looking for was balanced on top of a pile of dirty clothes and Louis grabbed it before he could spend more of his precious time thinking about such mundane topics as household chores.

Once he’d sat down in the living room he swung open the lid and pressed the ‘on’ button, anxious to begin. Harry’s small computer seemed to take an age to load while the young man waited there expectantly, beginning to wonder why exactly he was so excited about the task he was about to perform. The familiar Windows start-up music played ridiculously loudly through the stylish headphones – no wonder Harry was going deaf! – and he clicked on the internet icon before the mouse had even transformed from an hour glass back into the normal cursor.

Thankfully the browser was working unusually quickly and a few seconds later Louis’ best mate’s iGoogle page filled the screen. Suddenly unsure as to whether it was a good idea or not, the fringed young man froze for a moment, his fingers hovering over the mouse pad. Exactly what was worrying him about the plan he wasn’t sure but a voice in the back of his head was telling him that maybe there were things he didn‘t want to know about his friend.

After a few seconds of indecision he steeled himself, moved the cursor over the small arrow that would reveal Harry’s browsing history, and clicked.

Louis didn’t really know what he’d been expecting – a few porn sites maybe, along with the social media web pages they all frequented and perhaps even the band’s Wikipedia entry. Yet the drop down menu that his previous action had revealed was full of strangely named sites, all of which seemed to have a small blue and white ‘t’ logo next to them.

He was deeply confused; he didn’t even know Harry had a Tumblr account, let alone that he used it so regularly! Scanning through the list of different pages the younger boy had visited felt a bit like trawling through Harry's mind: there was one labelled ‘One Direction’ as he’d expected but then a multitude of others such as ‘Chris Martin’, ‘hot girls’, ‘hot guys’ ( _how was Harry so comfortable with his own sexuality?_ Louis wondered) and ‘funny cat pictures’. But it was the site right at the top of the list that caught his attention and for some reason his mouse had found itself hovering over. The writing next to the small icon read ‘http://www.tumblr.com/larrystylinson’.

 _Larry Stylinson_. The two words that he hated most in the world, which kept him up tossing and turning every night, the one phrase that made him wish they had less dedicated fans. He definitely wasn’t going to click on the link no matter what.

The page that loaded was beautifully colour co-ordinated, was his first thought. The second was that there were far, far too many posts for him to have a hope in hell of getting through them all. Quite a few had a red heart in the top right-hand which he presumed meant that the other boy had liked them. Deciding that he might as well see what it was Harry found so entertaining about their so called ‘bromance’, he clicked on one and began to read.

***

Louis surfaced a few hours later to the sound of his housemate’s arrival home, shaken and pale. His initial curiosity had opened a massive can of worms that was anotherteenage1Dfan and now he knew he could never look at Harry in the same way again.

Speaking of the devil, the curly haired boy was now stood in the doorway, unaware of his friend’s predicament.

“So I got steak which I thought we could have tonight but I couldn’t find those little additive-filled sugary things you like…” His voice trailed off as he realised there was something terribly wrong with the atmosphere in the room. “What’s the matter Boo?” he asked softly and Louis flinched at the nickname as he remembered the context in which it had been used in the fictions he’d just read.

“What. The fuck. Is this?” he managed to respond, turning the laptop so that the teenager could see what it was on the screen. Harry paled a little, but maintained his composure by tossing a cheeky smile in his friend’s direction.

“Well it’s commonly called slash or fanfiction –” he began but was cut off again by the other young man.

“Why are you reading this?”

It was all he could do just to stop himself from screaming the words yet the younger boy seemed unaware of how precarious the situation had become.

“Well I’ve got to have something to masturbate with, haven’t I?” he joked, unwittingly sending Louis over the edge.

All of a sudden, Louis was crying his eyes out, his body convulsing as he was racked with tears, and the noises he made were indescribable. Some were screams, others merely guttural noises from the very centre of his being. Occasionally he would let out a coherent word or two: ‘trust’ and ‘friend’ being the most common.

Harry had run over the moment after his breakdown began and was trying to comfort his best friend to no avail. The older boy was totally inconsolable.

“I’m sorry, Lou, I’m so sorry,” the teenager whispered, his speed and pitch gradually increasing. “I didn’t mean it – I was just being stupid. Please look at me, Tommo!”

Louis glanced up at the boy, his eyes flashing white hot with anger and Harry was shocked by such raw emotion from the normally happy-go-lucky boy.

“I don’t want to look at you,” he spat, venom in his voice. The other young adult’s protestations were met with a stony glare through wet eyes. “You make me feel sick, _Haz_. I let you know that I’m, you know,” he whispered the forbidden word, “gay, and you went and searched up this! You’re perverted!”

The gasp from the curly haired lad told him he’d gone too far, but there was no way he could stop now.

“Why did you do this to me?” he spoke into the distance, his voice wobbling dangerously before throwing the laptop across the room dramatically and storming out. Harry was the one with tears in his eyed as silence filled the room.

**Author's Note:**

> No! I can't deal with the angst! I'm also really bad at writing it, but I hope this is OK anyway :)


End file.
